


Houseguest

by Kyuu333



Category: Gintama
Genre: Class 3-Z Ginpachi-sensei, M/M, Minor Swearing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-13
Updated: 2016-12-13
Packaged: 2018-09-08 07:25:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,269
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8835583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kyuu333/pseuds/Kyuu333
Summary: Ginpachi gets a surprise visitor in the middle of the night.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! Sorry for not updating my other fics for a while, I've been busy with a lot of things lately. Hopefully I can finish and publish more chapters soon, but for now here's a short, simple fic for an unrelated AU.
> 
> I've only read the last 3-Z light novel, so this is only based off what I know. There's not that much sakagin in this fic tbh ... in fact, they don't know each other very well. But I had more ideas that followed up, so maybe I'll write another chapter. For now, hope you enjoy!

When Ginpachi jolted awake, his pitch black bedroom made his heart jump in a brief panic. He nearly tumbled right out of his bed, cursing under his breath. It took a moment, but he managed to free himself from his tangle of sheets. The next actions were automatic—first, he snatched his glasses from the bedside table and slid them on, knowing their exact location even without eyesight as he’d always leave them in the same spot every night. Second, he stumbled recklessly over toward the door and practically slammed his fist against the light switch to illuminate the room.

He spun around after that, eyes darting. Only after he’d surveyed the entire small room did he start to relax, though he remained mostly on edge. At least he finally had the wits to ask himself: what the hell woke him up at this hour? Judging by feeling and by the dark sky he could see through his window, it was probably well past midnight. Certainly whatever disturbed him wasn’t a ghost, because ghosts don’t exist, so it couldn’t possibly be that. Not that he was scared or anything, just…mildly startled.

With a few deep breaths to calm his nerves, he backed into the door. That’s when he noticed it—beyond his room, he could hear a faint scratching sound somewhere down the hall. It seemed to be coming from the front door of his apartment…Ginpachi turned slowly, cold sweat breaking out on his brow and the feeling of unease rising yet again.

Whatever it was, it wasn’t a ghost, he had to firmly remind himself again. Ghosts don’t exist. But it didn’t seem like his imagination either, as he took a tense moment to strain his ears. No, he _definitely_ heard scratching. That or he was losing his mind. But in any case, he felt compelled to check it out—mostly because he couldn’t see himself going back to sleep while this was bothering him. There were a number of things that could’ve been causing the sound. Maybe it was a cat. Or a dog. Or a tree branch. Yeah, maybe a tree spontaneously grew tall enough to reach his floor of the apartment complex.

He could only speculate so much, though. Taking a breath, he rested his hand on the door handle, slowly pulled the door open…and zoomed out into the rest of his dark apartment to slam on the lights in every single room. Not really for any reason—he just felt like it. Uh-huh.

After all the tension building, including his very slow and cautious skirting to the front door, creepy background music included (which he tried to drown out by aggressively whispering the Doraemon theme song to himself), one look through the peephole blew the entire atmosphere away in one fell swoop. Ginpachi’s anxiousness turned to weary annoyance faster than he even thought possible.

“You’ve gotta be kidding me,” he grumbled, now quick to slide the chain lock free and yank the door wide open. Standing before him was none other than Sakamoto-sensei, who jumped hard at the abrupt change. He was holding a house key loosely in his hand—apparently the scratching noise had been him trying to jam it into a lock that it obviously didn’t fit into.

“K-Kintoki?! What’re ya doin’ at my house?” Ginpachi’s eye twitched involuntarily as his irritation spiked.

“This is _my_ house, you dumbass!!” he all but yelled, not even bothering to address that entirely incorrect name that made even less sense in this alternate storyline.

Sakamoto seemed taken aback for a moment—it was hard to tell with his eyes obscured by sunglasses. But after a beat, he slowly smiled. “Ahahaha! Oh, is that so? Sorry, I guess I got lost on my way home again…”

“How do you manage to get _this_ lost?! You don’t even know my address, how the hell did you find this place on complete accident??” Sakamoto laughed again, rubbing the back of his head.

“I know, right? I was just thinkin’ that. What’re the odds, ahaha!” His loud voice was honestly grating at the moment. Mixed with the late hour and the horror movie fake out, Ginpachi was just about ready to throw his colleague over the railing. But then, he’d realized something that made all murderous thoughts come to a halt. Under Sakamoto’s coat, he was wearing his usual outfit for school—pink dress shirt, green tie, suspenders. And over his shoulder, he carried a messenger bag—the same one Ginpachi saw him carrying around daily. This guy…had he been trying to find his way home ever since he left the office a ton of hours ago? If Ginpachi remembered correctly, the math teacher had walked out of Gintama High even earlier than Ginpachi himself.

“Anyway, sorry ‘bout that,” Sakamoto giggled sheepishly. He took a step back, the usual goofy grin plastered on his face. “Looks like I’m even worse at directions than I thought, huh! I should get back to searchin’. See ya tomorrow, Kintoki!” As he turned to leave, Ginpachi finally caught a glimpse of his weary eyes through the side of his sunglasses. The language teacher reached out before he could even think, and his fingers snagged onto Sakamoto’s sleeve.

“Hey!! Don’t you ‘see ya tomorrow’ me, asshole!! Do you have any idea what time it is?!”

Sakamoto stopped in his tracks and turned back to Ginpachi with a small frown. “Er, I don’t, actually. Do _you_ know?” Ginpachi opened his mouth and found himself hesitating. He never really looked at a clock, but…

“It’s _late_ ,” he snapped, recovering quickly with a save, “and you’re still out wandering at this hour with no clue where your house is?!” Sakamoto only seemed to hear the first part, his attention pulled away as he looked up at the sky.

“Wow! You’re right, it’s real dark out now, huh?”

That comment made Ginpachi pause for a good moment, shooting an incredulous look at his colleague. “Don’t tell me you _just_ noticed that.”

“Sure did! Ahahaha!”

Ginpachi had stop and pinch the bridge of his nose for a second. He took a deep breath before opening his mouth again. “… _HOW IN THE WOOOORLD?!!_ ”

“Now, now, Kintoki! You’ll cause a disturbance with all that yellin’.”

“Shut up!! _You’re_ the one disturbing me, here!” Ginpachi ran an agitated hand through his hair and gave a hefty sigh. “Ahh, screw everything, I just wanna go back to sleep as soon as possible. Now that you’re here, it’s not like I can just turn you away. And like hell am I gonna help you find your way home in the middle of the night. So get in here already.” He moved aside, grudgingly gesturing Sakamoto to enter. His colleague seemed confused.

“Huh?”

Ginpachi let out an impatient huff. “My place. Come in. Sleep. S’ _that_ clear enough for you?”

“Oh! Well I don’t wanna impose—”

Not even listening anymore, Ginpachi grabbed Sakamoto by the tie and dragged him inside, slamming the front door closed behind them.

“This is a one-time deal, alright?” Ginpachi said, releasing Sakamoto’s tie and stepping up onto the planked floor of the hallway. “Show up on my doorstep like this again and I’m leaving you in the cold, got it? Invest in a damn GPS or something.”

“Pardon the intrusion,” he heard Sakamoto murmur behind him, along with sounds of fumbling as his guest took off his shoes. But Ginpachi’s mind was elsewhere, focused on the problem at hand. His apartment wasn’t exactly a hospitable one—it was just affordable enough for him and his modest income, and definitely not equipped with anything to cater to a houseguest. Maybe he could—

“Hey, Kintoki.”

“Hah?!” Ginpachi snapped, turning to glare at Sakamoto in irritation for interrupting his train of thought. But that malice faded when he was met with a warm smile.

“Thanks fer lettin’ me stay.”

Ginpachi’s gaze lingered briefly before he averted it again. “Yeah, don’t mention it,” he muttered. Sakamoto’s eyes were still hidden behind his sunglasses, but even with that, Ginpachi was quick to realize something. All this time he’d worked alongside this guy, he’d never seen him make such an expression before…

But anyway, he wasn’t about to get sidetracked. Ginpachi looked from doorway to doorway before taking a step down the hall. “I’ll be honest here,” he voiced his concern, “I don’t really have a bed or anything for you to sleep on. Not even a futon.”

“Oh, that ain’t a problem! I can just lie on the floor.”

Ginpachi shot him a look. “Hell no, you’ll catch a cold.”

“Aw, well that’s considerate of ya, but-”

“If _you_ get sick, you’ll get the students sick, and then _I’ll_ get sick. I’m not gonna risk eternal suffering because of this. So no, you’re not sleeping on the floor.” Ginpachi turned back to the hall with that firm declaration, going back to thinking. He _did_ have a couch in the living room, but that old second-hand thing was lumpy and probably overall unpleasant to sleep on. He couldn’t think of any other option, though, so it wasn’t like they had much of a choice. With a short sigh, Ginpachi strode down the hall toward the living room. He was about to tell Sakamoto the plan when…

“Kintoki, I found a bed!”

Ginpachi spun around in confusion to find that Sakamoto had disappeared from the entrance. He gave the empty space a perplexed look until he realized that the door to his room was wide open. Letting out a distressed noise, he bounded to the doorway just in time to see Sakamoto crawl into his bed.

“G’night,” his guest yawned, curling up with the blanket.

“ _Heeeeey_!! That’s _my_ bed, you idiot! Get up!!” Ginpachi marched over and gave the blanket a yank but Sakamoto didn’t budge, already breathing deeply. “No one falls asleep that fast! Drop the act and get outta my room!” Ginpachi pulled on the blanket a few more times to no avail. Sakamoto had wrapped himself in it snugly—it would’ve been much easier to uncover him otherwise. In fact, he didn’t seem to be consciously resisting. Ginpachi stared at the back of his head.

“…Are you seriously asleep right now?” Getting no response, the language teacher scowled, edging over to the opposite side of the bed. He leaned over, put his hand right in front of Sakamoto’s face, and snapped his fingers several times. His guest was as still as stone—anyone who was fake-sleeping would’ve at least twitched at something like that. Meaning…

“You’re asleep,” Ginpachi stated hollowly. He stood back and stared for a long moment as Sakamoto snoozed away in front of him. For the most part, he was just dumbfounded at all the impossible things that this guy was capable of. Wandering around lost for hours, mistaking Ginpachi’s house for his own, not noticing that it was dark out, falling asleep in one second flat… how did this guy even _exist_? How did he survive every day? He didn’t even change out of any of his clothes before passing out. He still had his coat on. And his suspenders. And his god damn _sunglasses_. Seriously, why was he like this?

Ginpachi huffed, giving those specs a peeved look. Now that he focused on them, all he could think of now was that they’d get ruined if Sakamoto moved his head at all in his sleep. Without pausing to consider anything else, Ginpachi found himself leaning over again to carefully slide the sunglasses from Sakamoto’s face. The moment they came off, he froze, his eyes glued to Sakamoto’s freckled face that was fully uncovered for the first time.

Sakamoto looked…tired. It was even more prominent now that Ginpachi finally had a good look at him. The bags under his eyes were deep—almost as deep as Ginpachi’s were when pulling an all-nighter to grade all of his students’ work at the last minute. Well, it must’ve put a toll on even someone like Sakamoto to walk around hopelessly lost for, what, seven hours straight? Geez. Ginpachi knew that this guy had a reputation at school for being late to work because of his terrible sense of direction, and he’d seen him wander confusedly around the staff room, unable to find even his own desk, but he never thought about his colleague’s issue seriously until now.

Ginpachi watched for a little bit longer, folding the sunglasses and placing them lightly on his bedside table. Despite the clear fatigue plastered on his face, Sakamoto looked peaceful in his slumber—his eyelids were gently shut, his brow relaxed, his lips slightly parted. Even though he stole the bed, somehow Ginpachi just couldn’t find the heart to force him off of it. It just felt wrong…and anyway, Sakamoto didn’t look like he was ready to budge anytime soon.

“Fine, just this once,” he grumbled under his breath, pushing his own glasses up the bridge of his nose. He was done with putting effort into anything else for the night. Suppressing a yawn, he shuffled over to the door. With one last look back at Sakamoto, he shut the light off and closed the door behind himself. In the end, it was Ginpachi who had to bear with the lumpy couch—he only hoped he wouldn’t wake up in the morning with back pain. As he turned off the lights in the rest of the apartment, he wondered if he’d be able to wake up early enough to get the both of them to work on time for once.


End file.
